There Was No Devil at the Grammys

Christians are taking aim at two pop stars playing dress-up while the real spiritual battle goes unfought.

In the SNL classic “Devil Can’t Write No Love Songs,” guest host Garth Brooks plays Milo, a luckless superstar-wannabe who’s lost his job and his girl, and can’t get his music career off the ground. “I’d sell my soul for a hit,” he wails. This summons Will Ferrell in full infernal regalia, wielding a devil-red Fender, who takes Milo up on his offer. 

“Now then, forsaken soul, open thine ears, and slake thy thirst on the music that could force kings to their knees and oceans to boil!!” bellows Satan. “Behold, the song that will take you to the top of charts!” He launches into an off-tune dud called “Fred’s Got Slacks.” 

It captures Ferrell at the peak of his sketch comedy prowess, puffing Satan up with Ron Burgundy levels of arrogance that deflate at the slightest hitch. His Satan blames the out-of-tune guitar (“is it humid in here?”) and resorts to self-affirmation (“I can’t be so critical. Just gotta get out of my head.”) Brooks is a solid straight man, his awe melting into confusion and then pity as he realizes that for all the Hadean trappings and infernal bravado, this devil isn’t worth his time. 

I thought of this sketch in the aftermath of the Grammys. Most of the music discourse centered around Beyonce, whose ongoing exclusion from the big awards has gone from surprising to to strange to looking suspiciously personal. At this point, the Grammys have way more credibility to gain from giving Beyonce her due than she does from actually securing an award. Still, the Grammys have their charms. Bad Bunny’s opener was electric, I loved the Stevie/Stapleton colab and Questlove, always one of our era’s great curators, stuck the landing on his sweeping history of rap tribute.  

But for a certain segment of pop culture tourist, the real talking point of the night was Sam Smith and Kim Petras’ performance of “Unholy,” the TikTok hit that made Petras the first transgender winner of the Best Pop Duo/Group Performance.

Their Grammy performance was ripped from that SNL sketch, featuring all manner of red tights, goat horns and other Spirit Halloween props. It’s one of the most time-honored tricks in showbiz. When an artist is ready to really lean into their daringly transgressive era, they whip out the pitchforks and pentagrams. It’s so time-honored that it feels pretty warmed over. We’ve all heard Ozzy, right? Alice Cooper? Hell, an artist as unforgivably tame as Katy Perry tried just this stunt at the Grammys less than ten years ago. Lil Nas X just did this. 

Nevertheless, commentators took their marching orders and were either dutifully outraged or at least pretended to be for their audience. There’s just no way Smith and Petras didn’t see this as bait, and all the usual fish swallowed it whole. And in doing so, they revealed something important about our popular understanding of what the devil is and how it works, and I think it explains a good deal about the current state of things.